Abcers Hail Return To Their Golden Age

August 23, 1991|By Steve Nidetz.

For ABC, this college football season will be a return to the good old days. The days before Supreme Court decisions and CBS contracts and Federal Trade Commission investigations. Back to the days of one network, sometimes one game.

``We`re going back to what we used to do,`` says coordinating producer Bob Goodrich, who will be coordinating as many as six games on a Saturday. Just like the old days. ``In the 20 years I`ve been with ABC, I don`t know of any series that is looked forward to any more than the return of all network college football to ABC, both by the young kids who have never done it and by the veterans who are anxious to get back out there.``

One of those veterans is Keith Jackson, who was a happy man when ABC outbid CBS last year for the College Football Association package-minus renegade Notre Dame.

``I missed going to Norman and Birmingham and Death Valley in South Carolina,`` says Jackson, who has recovered from lung surgery earlier this year. ``I missed it very much. Because there are certain parts of the country, like a Fayetteville, Ark., that have a certain flavor. You can feed off of it. It gives you a different attitude when you do certain teams so many times.

``That`s one of the things I don`t particularly care about pro football, because the flavor doesn`t change that much. The game isn`t that different. The best people are always the cornerbacks and the linebackers.

``To be able to go down and do an Auburn-Alabama game once in a while or go down to Oklahoma-Texas or go to Smith`s Barbecue in College Station, Texas, that`s got some down-home flavor to it that means something to me. It`s a grass-roots adventure.``

Brent Musburger, who joined ABC a year ago (Saturday`s Little League World Series telecast marks his anniversary), will call the CFA opener Aug. 31 between Miami (Fla.) and Arkansas.

``College football is the most exciting sport I`ve ever done because of the environment and the atmosphere around the game,`` says Musburger. ``A bad NFL game is a bad game to be around. A bad college football game ain`t all that bad.``